Speaking at the 13th Annual Residential Congress of the National Health Students Association of Ghana at Korle Bu in Accra, Mr Mahama said the exemption would better serve the scheme instead of the current arrangement which unfortunately “causes the NHIS to lose some of the funds they will otherwise have retained for their operations, including the payment of claims.”

Under the Earmarked Funds Capping and Re-alignment law the Parliament in 2017, statutory funds, including that of the NHIS, cannot go beyond a 20 per cent threshold of the national budget.

The three-day congress, which was on the theme: “Quality Health Education and Sustainable Employment; Reviewing the Past and Present to Repair the Future” ended last Friday.

Subscribers

Mr Mahama said from less than one million subscribers under President John Agyekum Kufour, the NIHS expanded to about 11 million subscribers under his administration, which used 10 per cent of the Annual Budget Funding Amount from oil revenue to support the scheme.

“The government should exempt the National Health Insurance Scheme from the Capping and Realignment so that we can have enough money to cater for the subscribers to the health insurance,” the former president advised.

Congress

Former President Mahama, who is the flag-bearer of the NDC for the 2020 general election, also encouraged student movements to use student activism as a tool to achieve accelerated development.

He noted that student movements had made valuable contributions to the progress of the country, recalling their contribution to the setting up of the Ghana Education Trust Fund (GETFund).

“Since the establishment of the GETFund, it has been the single largest contributor to educational infrastructure in the history of Ghana,” he added.